Saturday, May 25, 2013

Earthquake Hits Entire Russia

Today is a big, unique day.

At 5.44 UTC something shaked really hard 600km deep under Okhotsk Sea in Kamchatka. This is Russian Far East, one of the most remote regions of Siberia accessible only by helicopters and such funny devices:

Magnitude of the shake was 8.3 (max is around M10) but its depth was about 600 km, which makes it one of the deepest earthquakes ever recorded. Such deep earthquakes happen very rarely, maybe once in a century, that's why we know very little about their nature.

Another unique fact of this quake was the distance where it was felt. Responses were coming from as far as Dubai - that's humble 8999 km! Illinois, California, Indonesia and India felt it!

Indeed, in Russia a lot of people felt it. Siberian seismic stations even issued a report about an earthquake in Sayan mountains, I even mentioned it on Twitter. In Moscow 900 people were evacuated.

Me? I did not feel it, nor any of my friends. Feeling a bit disadvantaged.

You want to ask about weather? Well, feels like autumn or monsoon season. Rains, rains, rains.